Into The Dark
by Reverse Gravity
Summary: The final battle. Naruto has come to bring Sasuke home. And Sasuke... Has found Itachi. [Stereogram Style. Complete]


_Note (__**IMPORTANT): **__This is a stereogram. Haku's perspective will be regular font and Sasuke's will be italic, Naruto's experience in bold. _

DISCLAIMER: don't own and never will.

**Into the Dark  
**_By Reverse_

Love of mine  
Someday you will die  
But I'll be close behind  
I'll follow you into the dark

If heaven and hell decide that they both are satisfied  
Illuminate the no's on their vacancy signs  
If there's no one beside you when your soul embarks  
Then I'll follow you into the dark  
_(Death Cab for Cutie)_

_

* * *

_

He was finally leaving me. This was it; the final moments that defined our lives. The sheer pressure in the air made my own breathing labored; but his was only the faint trace of a ghost. It only reinforced the existence of mortality we all fought to the death. But this fight was not like any other; the boy standing like the walking dead.

* * *

The chakra swirled around that boy; Naruto, it was fiery and angry. Enraged by the way I had cast aside his teammate before; he had yet to die, but the boy didn't know that. I watched as my whole purpose shattered. This boy with all this cunning power shattered my mirrors. My beliefs and idealisms fell like those crystals. First the slow, agonizingly painful realization; then the cracking and revelation of flaws… Then came the shattering point, the crystal walls could not contain the vicious bloodthirsty power of this boy. 

_The searing hot ache spread over my body in panic; I had been here before. This place haunted my dreams and was the worst nightmare I could conjure. The sky was bloodied, as if all the blood from this world of torture somehow ended up here. The power was catastrophic. Again I watched as the most important people in the world were taken from me. Then it changed…_

I don't know what possessed him, but his power changed, morphed into something so terrifying and raw that it tore my identity away. The mask fell to pieces from my face, from the terrifying blow. There was no power I could hold and match to this fearsome being, no attacks. No needles I could throw, no crystal cage I could capture. Fighting was futile. Against him…

_It was all useless. I was trapped and caged within this malice. The Mangekyo Sharingan. This world of illusionary hell with Itachi as its devil. My heart had hardened beyond bearing. Everything now was only a repetition; a more real version of what I had lived in all of my raging nightmares. My parents again fell in front of my eyes. I didn't even notice; focused instead on the cold eyes of Itatchi, those eyes didn't pierce my soul like they used to. They didn't rip and tear me up. It was looking back at myself, my own empty cold eyes. _

**I know how to see the inside of the soul; the eyes. I don't know how I didn't realize this in the past, seeing Sasuke's eyes so often betraying his hate and anger. He is gone now; there is no hope from anybody left. Only mine, I still have hope for him. **

The anger began to fade as my mask fell in pieces, destroyed. There were tears beneath the surface, but I was empty inside, as empty as the puppet he claimed I was. This amazing boy was saddened by my story, his eyes holding his own sadness. Similar eyes, but eyes with hope. Even as his friend lay dead or dying, he believed. There was still his insatiable hope.

_Itatchi seemed to realize he had no power over me, but that shift in power. The scene changed beneath that bloody sky. I stood looking down. Naruto was bleeding on the ground. Itachi stood over him before looking up at me "I've found my jinchuriki." _

**It shouldn't disturb me so much that Sasuke betrayed us, but it still hurts like a deep fleshy hole in my heart. He would find power. I knew that's what he was doing, finding the means to destroy Itatchi. I couldn't help but think it would be the end, that he would never come back. That he was running to his death. **

"Please" I said, my voice was soft and angelic, hopeless but still clinging to what I could. What was left, all that was left, was Zabuza. "Kill me." I asked, I begged, I wished upon myself the final blows. I was only a tool, now I was broken. I was flawed and cracked and shattered and I didn't want to live. There was nothing for me to life for anymore.

_I wanted to save Naruto. That automatic instinct was beginning to rise; I knew he was alive somewhere but my tyrant and traitorous mind whispered that Itachi may have gotten him. That I could have lost him. This terrible power of the Sharingan made me hate him even more. But Itachi had slipped up. He had given me some movement. I slipped my tongue in between my teeth. And I bit hard…_

I clenched my jaw, waiting for the pain. His words haunted me. I wanted to be is friend. He would have been a good friend. But it was over, my life had already shattered. There was nothing left for me to do. He rushed at me with the sudden determination and understanding. There was a flicker of something in his eyes; empathy perhaps.

**I remembered when I had made my pact to never break a promise. When I couldn't bring Sasuke back it felt like I had nothing to live for. I had broken my nido; my only rule as a shinobi. The first thought that had occurred was about Sasuke. The second was about my nindo. I had broken it; did it mean I was no longer the shinobi I had aspired to be. **

_This world broke apart with the coppery coating of blood in my mouth. There we stood, my brother and I facing each other with the most sinister curses. The Sharingan. How I hated the existence of the gift; it would cause nothing but pain. I wanted it to be gone from this world. I wanted it to die with Itachi and me. I would do everything to bring this power down. I would die for it. _

**My feet barely brushed the branches. I was moving towards them, I knew that Sasuke was here, that he had found what he was looking for. Still, my mind edged me faster and further. **

He came at me like a whirlwind, rushing, every second he edged closer. Closer to me, a bringer of death… There was a sound then, a sound that echoed like the tortured screams of angry birds. It too would bring death. I held my hand out and stayed his. I would not have to bloody the naïve hands of this boy with my life. My life was only a thought, a bare consideration before…

**This was sacrifice. Sasuke was fighting out there with Itachi, It would end a death fight; there is no other way for this to end, it was the bodies of the walking dead that would fight. The last Uchihas' annihilating the clan. **

_My attack was chosen as the soft flapping of doves, he readied his own and we fought. Our hits landed at the same time. I pushed myself farther into is raging chakra force. Driving my own lightning force into his heart. Simultaneous bursts of blood sprayed from my mouth and his._

I saw the burst of blood as I felt the electricity mangle my heart. My heart was gone, stopped. There were no morals as I looked up to lock Zabuza's attacker in my death grip. My hand would lock him in this trap, the last thing for Zabuza. The waterfall gushed but I couldn't feel the wetness. The pain was ending, this was…

_The end was here for me. I knew that there was nothing left. I only lived to destroy my brother and end my pain. This was a way to end the pain. I had already abandoned the other idea of Itachi's. I would not revive the clan; nobody deserved to see the hurt the power brought. Or feel the pain it was made to inflict. I had already decided I would die with it. I fell. I saw Itachi from where I lay. I was still breathing, but he was dead. Finally gone, I felt relief as my breath became more and more shallow. _

**Sasuke is in my sight, I can see him beside the body of his brother; he's still alive, defying the laws of survival. I run toward the moment that would define the breaking or making point of my life. This outcome can melt or mend my heart. But it was too late to back out and go home now, if I must… Sasuke!  
I'll follow you into the dark. **


End file.
